They learned their theology from the Augsburg
catechism, composed by Luther, or from the ``institutes
of Christianity,'' written by Calvin, or they mumbled the
Thirty-Nine Articles of Faith which were printed in the English
Book of Common Prayer, and they were told that these
alone represented the ``True Faith.''
They heard of the wholesale theft of church property
perpetrated by King Henry VIII, the much-married monarch of
England, who made himself the supreme head of the English
church, and assumed the old papal rights of appointing bishops
and priests. They had a nightmare whenever some one
mentioned the Holy Inquisition, with its dungeons and its
many torture chambers, and they were treated to equally horrible
stories of how a mob of outraged Dutch Protestants had
got hold of a dozen defenceless old priests and hanged them
for the sheer pleasure of killing those who professed
a different faith. It was unfortunate that the two
contending parties were so equally matched. Otherwise
the struggle would have come to a quick solution.
Now it dragged on for eight generations, and
it grew so complicated that I can only tell you the most
important details, and must ask you to get the
rest from one of the many histories of the Reformation.
The great reform movement of the Protestants
had been followed by a thoroughgoing reform
within the bosom of the Church.
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